


Merfolks don't walk on land, do they?

by riotousorder



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, M/M, Mermaid and Pirate Love, Runes Magic, mer!Keith, pirate!Lance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-19
Updated: 2018-09-19
Packaged: 2019-07-14 11:16:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16039376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/riotousorder/pseuds/riotousorder
Summary: The sea had been off limit for as long as the world had existed, With Allura’s execution day looming over the horizon and the flocks of carrier eagles mysteriously dying, Lance made a bold decision to reach the Empire by sea. The only problem was, he was the first ever person dare set foot on the sea with no ideas how to navigate. Thankfully, he found help from a self-proclaimed merfolk with feet for tail named Keith. Now, if only Keith cooperated and stopped flinging himself into the damn sea below, Lance would forever appreciate it and even give him a kiss thank you.





	Merfolks don't walk on land, do they?

**Author's Note:**

> My piece for the Klance Big Bang 2018. HUGE SHOUT OUT TO THE LOVELY ARTISTS THAT CREATE ART FOR THIS CHAOTIC WRITING OF MINE: 0rchidd and Lucy. Please show them all the love. They are tehe bestest, most talented artists I am partnered with. I am so happy to be your partner for this bang <3 <3!!

_This is it_ , Lance thought grimly. _This is the end._

 

He couldn't hold out much longer. His strength waned, his will frayed. The pain clawed and gnawed on his inside, no longer the annoying ignorable itch in his throat he couldn't reach to scratch away. It growled and wailed, demanding his attention and his subsequent succumb.

 

As smooth as letting go of a ledge and tumbling into the ragged sea below, Lance gave in.

 

He was free at last.

 

With a reverent pray for Pidge’s forgiveness, he let loose an echoing maniacal laugh and plunged his sword hilt deep into the abdomen of a purple blob minion. His laugh was as fitting as a fish on dry land. It didn't belong to a battle strewn courtyard, with dozens of enemies closing in on him and houses burning around them.

 

Before the sand its body disintegrated onto the ground, he pivoted on his heels and took aim. Blue’s slender silver form seamlessly bled into the body of a beautiful flintlock. Lance fired, whooping aloud. The bullet met three of its intended marks; the fourth mark fortunately only lost an arm. It barreled unsteadily towards him, gibberish gurgling from a dark circle on its face in the place of a mouth. Lance lowered himself to the ground and shot forward, laughter bubbling out of him in terrifying gales. He evaded the clumsy stab, soothed the petulant flintlock into a pair of glinting knives and slashed off the head cleanly. The helmet made a satisfying clanging noise as it hit cobbled ground.

 

Lance laughed again, breathlessly but cheerfully. It felt great to laugh. The thrill of battle sung in his blood, the danger it posed pulsed through him like fire running along a trail of gunpowder. He relished in it, the rush of excitement as he cut down enemies, the grim victory as he lessened Galra army one after another, and the blossoming happiness that he was returning a town to its rightful owner.

 

"Lance! Stop fucking laughing!” Pidge shouted from behind him, then grunted as _shinking_ of metal on metal started anew.

 

Lance turned around.

 

Behind him, Pidge shouted, then grunted as clanging of metal reached his ears. She made up most of her curses. He had no idea what the meaning of her curses was. The whooshing of her circular deadly blade returning to her hand and another satisfying clanging of various armor parts on cobbled earth told him she had taken down the last of the enemies.

 

Silence met his his ears. A silence among the roaring of fire gulping down settlements and guillotine. The heat didn't bother him. It never did, but Pidge swiped an arm irritatingly over her brows. It came back soaked through with sweat and covered in black soot. She ‘tched’ derisively and brought her arm back up again, only managing to smear more soot all over her face rather than clearing it. Her hair, a rat nest of frizzy brown locks, curled even tighter in the heat and matted together.

 

"Fucking soot," she spat, wiping her cheek vehemently with the heel of her hand. A layer of grainy black panned out further under her touch, not going away at all.

 

Lance licked his thumb, a taste of metal, sweat and salty grime intruding his mouth, and dragged it across her cheek. Pidge jumped away from him as if electrocuted, screeching. He stuck a tongue out at her. Pidge made it so fun to mess with her.

 

“You were asking for it,” he said, wiping his finger on his soot-covered coat. As fun as it was to play with Pidge, he knew when to stop.

 

“When we get back onboard, I swear on every deity believed by humans, elves and galras, you will regret it." She growled, angling her glinting half-moon blades in his direction. Orange flickers gleamed on saw-toothed edge, dancing around in her eyes. To anyone else, she would look deadly and dangerous. To Lance, she looked just like a cute puffed-up owlet. And Lance being Lance, he reached out to pat her hair and almost got decapitated for his humor.

 

"Easy on the body would cha?" Lance jumped backwards, well away from the reach of her short arms. "This skin is worth a million, Pidge."

 

"Yeah," she agreed, clipping her blades onto either side of her belt like shining ear loops, if ear loops could cut people in two that was. "Worth making a million rugs out of."

 

"Rugs that line the hall of the castle and makes all the ladies swoon at theirs soft touch, you mean." Lance waggled his eyebrows suggestively, crossing his arms and jutting his chin out.

 

Pidge scoffed noisily, obviously in disagreement and awe at his humor, and instead reached into her boot. She pulled out a thick swat of rune-lined paper, shuffling through them until she found what she needed and returned the rest to her boot. Lance eyed the bundle of paper with questions. It was too thick to be hidden in her boot for her to walk comfortably.

 

"Are more coming?" He asked, twirling the knives in his hands until they molded together back into a flintlock. The lovely thing trilled at him, blue gems along the barrels twinkling like stars at night. He aimed it at a dark alley to his left, beyond the curtain of fire, expecting a burbling mass of purple humanoid creatures to come pouring out like a swarm of bees.

 

"No, we got them all," said Pidge, tearing the piece of paper with a horizontal S shape cut through with a straight-line sigil in four. Sparks flew out from the ragged edges and consumed the paper in brown flakes until they were nothing but a flicker elephant of memory. Pidge closed her eyes then, smoothing out her face as she concentrated her thoughts on Hunk. Lance unconsciously slowed his breathing and kept still. Telepathic runes were hard to create and harder still to use. They required an unholy amount of concentration that his scattered brain and short attention span could not produce. Whenever they had to split up, either Pidge or Hunk would have to stick with him lest he derailed the whole plan when left alone and uncoordinated.

 

"Stop thinking," Pidge grumbled, still with her eyes close. "You're distracting me."

 

Lance spared her a cheeky smile even as his mind toppled over with awe and jealousy. Pidge and Hunk were super like that, they could _talk_ with him even as they were talking to each other via mental link. Juggling two conversations at the same time.

 

"Hunk will meet us at the rendezvous," Pidge announced, palming the side of her head as the after effect of using telepathic rune took effect. "And he is bringing a passenger."

 

Lance perked up.

 

"Who? Anyone we know?"

 

"Didn't say. Though he sounded worked up."

 

"Alrighty then, let's go. Pidge would you do the honor of taking a few steps back and reveling in the presence of the great sorcerer Lance? Thank you, and now, behold the spectacle!"

 

Lance thrusted his arms forward. Fire flowed through the cracks in his control, faster and more chaotic and imagined holding the reigns of rouge horses. Lance pulled at them, hard. The fire around him flared in resistance, not wanting to be held down. He didn't give in. If they tried to escape, he just needed to be stronger. He hung on tight, slowly, painstakingly diverted their attention to where he wanted. Then he let them go. Fire surged forward, out of him and reduced the building to ash in a brilliant display of banana color ripples. Not as white as he was working towards but it was good enough. Light seared his eyes. But the heat called for him, caressed his hair and hands like a longtime friend. Lance smirked briefly. For a friend, they were pretty grumpy about offering aid. Maybe fire was a cat. He felt a slight flick on his ears for that.

 

He kept the fire contained for a good minute before letting go of the lid he kept on the fire. They whooped joyfully, their joy rippling his soul and dispersed into the cooling air, leaving nothing but ash and the light that was permanently shrouding his vision.

 

Pidge chuckled, shaking her head slightly then she untied the _blindfold_ across her eyes.

 

“Impressive.”

 

Lance didn’t bother masking his disdain as he threw his arms skyward.

 

“Impressive? _Impressive_!” Lance echoed, his throat constructing as his voice climbed two notched higher, shaking his arms for good measures. “You didn’t see anything!”

 

“But _now_ I can see, and you can’t.”

 

Pidge was right of course, but Lance was not going to tell her that. His vision still blotched with fog and dancing sparks of black

 

“Cease all the smart-assing and give me the praise where it’s due, Pidge.” That yellow fire? That was something he was working toward to! For weeks!

 

“And what? Let your ballooning ego sink our ship? No thank you.”

 

“Piiidge!” Lance was not above whining when he wanted something.

 

She gave him a mock bow before dashing away, blades clanking at her side, her boots noiseless as she ran through soot-covered ground.  Lance quenched his petulance and shot after her. Maybe Hunk would praise him. No, definitely. Hunk was a great friend like that.

 

Pidge was as fast as a squirrel, with nimble limbs and sharp turns, but Lance caught up with her in no time thanks to his incredible long legs. He gave her a wink and felt her irritation rolling on his skin. Height was a sore spot for Pidge.

 

They reached the mouth of the alley where they had come through. Two sigils painted on either side of the wall glowed an eerie green. Pidge smashed one painted on head stone with a powerful axe kick as Lance shoot another dead center. The noise-cancellation and illusion dome shimmered away, revealing the wrecked courtyard and downed Galra soldiers for the early risers of townspeople. A gift, as he liked to call them, to tell everyone the fight was still going, even with their head cut off.

 

* * *

 

The run wasn't that long but with the town slowly waking up, they were forced to take the detour into the woods to meet Hunk. They could not be seen.

 

Around them, nature started to wake. Lance ducked and weaved through foliages, disrupting a family of birds. Pidge slid on a patch of moist moss and almost landed on her butt. Lance caught her forearm and hauled her to stability. She nodded. They kept running. Leaves crunched brittlely under their boots. Birds chirped liltingly from the canopy overhead. Dabble of pink grape light penetrated thick layers of leaves. From beyond the trees, he could hear water softly sloshing against earthen bank, working its way through fence of tree roots.

 

Lance kept running, muscles heating up, breath flowed out of him in rhythmic pattern. His thoughts ran afoul in the absence of urgent things to think about. He missed home. He missed mom's gentle chiding when he stayed out too long and forgot his meal. He missed dad and his solid presence. He missed Allura and her fire when she led their people into revolutionary. He missed a step. The heart stopping moment yanked him back into reality. Water wasn't safe. Land wasn't safe. Sky wasn't safe. Nowhere was safe. It was a matter of making the best out of the worst. The sea made a logical choice.

 

The trees ahead of him had started to part, revealing a calm of the morning river. Hunk sat there, a dark sturdy silhouette against the brightening east, on their little boat hidden among tree roots.

 

Lance widened his steps and skidded to a halt on the bank right next to the rickety old thing, barely out of breath. Pidge was beside him an instant later, hand bracing on his bicep as she bent forward in exertion. With more lights, he scanned her for injury. No obvious wounds, but her body was covered in a fine layer of ash and soot. Lance knew hidden underneath might be red swells and blisters. Fire burnt indiscriminately. He turned to Hunk, doing the same. His best friend appeared unharmed safe for some tears on his clothes and smudges of dirt on his forehead. Hunk wore a bright but strained around the edge smile as he saw them approach, his hand wrapping tightly around a pair of wooden paddles across his knees.

 

“Hey guys." Hunk's eyes roamed over them, up and down, then right to left. "Rough time?"

 

Lance brushed a speck of soot out of zillions of others off his shoulder, adopting a lazy smile. A small puff of them floated into the morning air, dancing in the sunlight.

 

Lance was about to open his mouth to inform Hunk that, no, he was too awesome to have a 'rough night' when Pidge butted in tonelessly.

 

"He laughed," she said, climbing into the too small boat.

 

Hunk leveled an exasperated glare at him.

 

"Really, Lance?"

 

"What? Jealous of my chime-like crystal clear awesome laugh?" Lance wiggled his eyebrows, steadying the boat with his hand before climbing in. Wood creaked ominously under his light hold. His steel-soled boots struck the wet wood with a resonating thump. He slipped a little, but that was all it took to make the boat rock dangerously. The left side, where Pidge was sitting uncomfortably, leant ominously close the water, almost flipping over and threw all of them over Hunk let out a startled yelp, blindly reached over to the bank and grabbed a tangle of roots to steady the boat. The sudden stop threw him back onto his butt. The boat's other end lifted into the air and came back down with a noisy splash in the still dawn, water panning out in large rippling waves.

 

"Lance!" Pidge screeched, holding onto the edge for dear life, her face white as paper.

 

"Sorry sorry." He coughed awkwardly, gingerly sitting up. Lance repressed a shiver at the sudden coldness as his pants were soaked through the moment his butt met moist wood.

 

Hunk glared balefully at him, a hand hovering above his chest and the other gripping the edge of the boat so tightly his knuckles went white.

 

"Buddy, Lance, I love you but we are too close to the sea for a swim right now." Hunk looked over his own shoulder, to the river met the open sea, where murky river water met the deep blue of the vast ocean. A barrier between the known and unknown. Safety and danger.

 

Lance scratched his head sheepishly. He knew Hunk and Pidge were deadly wary of the sea, from all the tales and lore they were told since childhood. Lance was told the same thing, of a time long past when the sea tolerated other beings, fluidly, gentle sea that helped human, Galra, dragons and elves alike; and of a betrayal so deeply the sea vowed to destroy all who trespassed her territory. Pidge and Hunk heeded the story without question. Lance took the tale with two grains of salt.

 

He had given his friends quite a scare.

 

"Sorry buddy," he apologized again, catching Pidge's eyes on his left and Hunk's opposite of him. The fear was apparent in them.

 

Lance bit down on his lips. He really should be more careful. Them agreeing to go with him on this suicidal fools' errand even with their fear for the ocean was a blessing in and of itself. He couldn't fuck this up, not for them, not for Allura, not for everyone else. So he looked around, looking for something to blabber about, to get their mind off the ocean, to give them the time they needed to calm their heart. His eyes roamed over the trees, leaves hanging low in a perpetual kiss with the mirror water. He spotted flutters of wings among greens, bubbles popping near a tree root. He turned his eyes skyward, to the receding indigo of the night, and strawberry pink and pineapple yellow of dawn pointing sharp knifes at it. Lance sat up straighter in his place, craning his neck to look at the sun silhouetting Hunk. It was bright, eye-hurting so, a burning vibrant lemon hanging precariously on the fine line between sea and sky, how bright it was compared to the evil and hardship that the lands had to bare. His mouth twisted downward unconsciously, bleak thoughts flocking around the edge of his mind, waiting to be touched upon. No, nope, he was not going there. Lance shook his hair curtly. This wasn't time for the ‘what would happen’. Right now, he needed to get his friends' mind off of the unforeseen future with some mundane, irrelevant thing. His eyes resumed their mad rounds in the sockets, searching for something that was not trees, birds, sky, sun or the future to talk about. A flash of white from behind Hunk as he bent his head forward entered his vision. His breath got stuck in his throat. Whoever was sitting there, half shadowed by Hunk's bulky figure, was beautiful. They were all white, white hair, white skin safe for a black tattoo near their eye, even the rags covering their body was white, which was unfathomable if they were a simple slave. A prisoner of war then. An important prisoner of war.

 

"Who's that?" Lance blurted out before he could think twice about it, still studying the colorless figure and picking out some colors on their features. Their lips had an unhealthy ice blue tint and their wrists were a pinkish red where barnacles cut them.

 

Hunk startled and turned his head to look at the person Lance gestured to, as if forgetting they existed in the first place. Besides him, Pidge shifted in her place, tuning back into the present rather than wandering into the deep wasteland of their mind.

 

"I found him in the dungeon, all chained up. I thought he was dead."

 

"Yeah, I can see why," Pidge chimed in wryly, leaning forward to get a better look at their passenger. "Any idea who he is?"

 

"Doesn't look like anyone I know." Hunk shook his head.

 

Lance put two fingers on his lips, thinking. Out of three of them, Hunk personally knew almost all the people in the revolution before it had broken apart. If Hunk said he didn't recognize someone, high chance was that the guy was a slave. _A specific kind of slave,_ Lance thought, _with his lean figure and well-defined face_. His heart twisted in sympathy for him. Sex slaves weren't uncommon in these outback islands.

 

"He can stay onboard with us until we reach the next island." Lance decided, reaching across to take a paddle off Hunk's laps. He pushed away from the bank. Townsfolk were bound to get up soon and the three of them couldn't risk being seen. They had wasted enough time as it was. Pidge spat profanity as he accidentally elbowed her head

 

"Next time you move, warn." she hissed, fingers twitching dangerously close to the sharp blades at her belt.

 

Lance's jest died on his throat. He did not want to have those blades anywhere near his skin. No, absolutely not. Even by looking at it, he could feel his head leaving its perch on his neck. His fingers went numb by his side, cold spreading from the tip vining to his bloodstream and piercing his heart.

 

"Pidge, stop feeding feelings to your weapons please." Hunk’s warm but stern tenor broke through the whispering pit of his mind. Suddenly he could think clearly, the irrational fear faded into nothingness like smoke in the wind.

 

"You cheated!" Lance rounded on Pidge, who had the audacity to shrug and smirk at him!

 

"Not cheating. My lovelies," She smoothed a finger along the fine edge of the blade. Lance quenched down the irrational fear that she would cut her finger off. "Share my feelings too."

 

"'Share feelings' my ass! If-"

 

The boat suddenly propelled itself forward as Hunk thunked his paddle into the water with a splash. An irritated, I-have-had-enough-of-you-two splash if Lance was being honest with himself. Lance hastily plunged his paddle into the water and saw Pidge taking Hunk's proffered paddle and did the same. An angry smiling Hunk was as bad as a storm at sea. They turned the boat around and guided it across the river and straight into the thick mane of tree roots on the opposite bank. When a crash seemed imminent, their little boat plowed onward unhindered, passing harmlessly _through._ A dark, narrow tunnel of roots opened up, just wide enough to fit their boat. Hunk bent forward uncomfortably on his waist to avoid brushing his hair against the roots. Lance slouched for a fraction, hair a literal hair-breathed from sweeping the dirt-covered root. Light penetrated as thin white sporadic strips through the leaves then the tightly woven roots. they didn’t need to paddle. The river flow carried the boat at a leisure speed through the tunnel, water lapping gently against the hull. If he just closed his eyes, he could see himself back in his room in Valadel with a window facing the lake, watching sunrise over snowy mountain tops with Mom, the reddish first ray of sunlight shining on her lush brown hair and illuminating her nice sky blue eyes. Lance was lucky enough to have both her features. But she would kill to have dad’s or Allura’s white fluff of hair though. White hair and blue eyes? All the ladies would die for him and gents would be jealous of him. Then mom would take him up to stand on the window sill, higher than her so the sun would greet him first, or if she was in a great mood, on her shoulders. Mom was as strong as Dad. He missed them. He missed Allura. They missed Allura. He couldn’t stand seeing that devastation eating its way through mom; her hair, oh so fluffy and lush as grass after the rain thinned noticeably. Dad could barely leave the couch, he sat there still as a doll, a cup of tea steaming until it went cold sat forgotten on the table. Lance could bring Allura back. No, he would. Allura had done so much for him, for mom and dad, and everyone else, this was the least he could do for her.

 

The clear air of dawn changed. A note of sharpness and anticipation punctured his nose and senses. Lance sat up straight. The view didn't so much as change from the semi-darkness, but he could feel it. The water below them moved, sharper and more violent.

 

They had reached the sea.

 

Pidge tensed up noticeably, fingers twitching over her blade again, as if somehow she could murder the vast expanse of sea. Hunk twisted the strap of his satchel bag so tightly Lance winced in pain for the ancient, poor thing and moved with deliberation to put his hand on the roots, feeling for a grove of an upside down ’T’, each action slow and clear. He wouldn’t want to startle the two of them. Hunk could literally chuck him off the boat if he was startled enough. He almost missed the sigil when his fingers brushed across it, too narrowly carved by Hunk.

 

With precise movement, Lance put a sloppy scratch over the sigil, nothing big or intentional, just a diagonal line that would disrupt and destroy the effect of a sigil. Immediately, he could feel the pulse of life trickle back into the trees as roots slowly slither their way back to their original place, tenseness and tiredness gone. Lance pulsed his lips briefly. The price off magic was high, he never really understand it until he started using it. It sucked literal life out of him, like a leech feasting on blood until he forcibly removed it.

 

A string of root withered and dropped into the water with a bubbling splash. The tree didn’t escape unscratched. Lance knew it, yet he still felt sorry. And he immediately wanted to laugh. He was feeling sorry for an inanimate object. Him, feeling immense regret, for a ruddy tree that would sooner or later fall with the flow of time. This was ridiculous. He was ridiculous. Behind them, tree roots started entangling, a ball of yarn with no means of telling where the end nor the beginning was. A root poked his sides, another wound around Hunk’s laps. Lance quickly made a sharp right, into an even narrower stone cavern as tree roots hid their entry away and threw them into complete darkness. Except it was not completely dark. A out-of-place soft, whitish glow came from behind and next to Hunk. Their passenger had glow-in-the-dark hair apparently. Lance mentally shrugged, more to think about their passenger later. Right now he needed to not crash the boat onto the rocky bank and send all of them sinking into the briny sea water below.

 

Thankfully it was a short ride. Soon enough, the tunnel opened up into a towering cavern, with lots of light and fresh air. And just before their eyes, the sturdy silhouette of the Castle Ship greeted them. In the pink light of dawn, it was a majestic thing indeed. Bigger than most of their fishing boats but smaller and less ornate than the ship that hailed the regents when Lance had the chance to see them on the Mainland years ago. Her majestic white sails rolled up onto the top of the mast. The ship stayed stationery, even as waves crashed onto its hull and almost sent Lance toppling sideways onto Pidge, who was breathing too slowly for it to be normal. Lance paddled the boat forward, straight towards the hanging rope ladder swaying to the wind. He grabbed it, hauled Pidge up to her feet and guided her hands to grab the scratchy thing. He gave her an encouraging nudge. She didn't so much as budge, muscles locked up tight, ready to flee. Lance nudged again, harder this time, straight into her ribs where he knew would get her shriek in surprise under normal circumstances. Right now, she merely jolted as his elbow made contact and looked at her hand that was clutching the rope so tightly her knuckles had gone white. A still moment passed. Pidge haltingly raised the other hand, gripped the rope and started climbing, every movement slow, like she was not at all there. Lance wondered if letting her go with him on this was such a good idea and immediately snorted. Right. As if Pidge would listen to him if he told her to stay. She was the same as him. She would come to the end of the world to rescue Matt, same with him and Allura. Lance steadied the ladder and waited for Pidge to clamber over the railing to look at Hunk.

 

“I’ll carry him." Lance intervened as Hunk dragged their out-cold pretty passenger over his shoulder.

 

Hunk gave him a confused stare, looked at Lance judgmentally then back at the load on his shoulder again. Lance bristled good-naturedly.

 

"Buddy, I'm as strong as you are. I can handle him." Lance flexed a muscle, lean and unnoticeable from under the coat he was wearing.

 

Hunk laughed, a small little laugh; a true laugh nevertheless. It filled Lance with peace and pride. Hunk was laughing again even though the lines around his eyes were still pulled tight.

 

“Sure you are, Lance." Hunk laid down the passenger carefully like porcelain and took a step over to him. Lance nodded his head towards the ladder. With one last smile, Hunk climbed up. The ladder swayed left to right underneath his hold. Lance didn't look up lest he got dirt from the boots into his eyes. With a grunt, Hunk heaved himself over the railing and finally the ladder stilled. Lance stepped toward the sleeping man, grimacing. He looked Lance's size, probably a little bit shorter and way thinner, no doubt from the days --weeks, months -- spent in captivity. His fingers, delicately positioned to rest on top of his chest, were literal skin-over-bones. Lance could easily snap all ten in half between his thumb and pinky fingers. With a sigh, Lance set to move the man onto his back. He untied the sash around his belt, threw it over his head and behind the stranger and tied them both together. It was flimsy at best but better than nothing. The boat slipped underneath him as he heaved himself to stand. A shriek escaped him. Lance tumbled forward, smashing his face and subsequently the passenger's thready arms onto the wet hull with a resounding thunk. His hand grappled for the ladder to steady himself and the boat that was steadily slipping away from him. Lance reeled the boat in with his feet, going perpendicular to the current. The man started slipping from his back. His left hand was grabbing the ladder rope, his right gripping the crack between two planks, so Lance bent forward. The man slipped back into the original position on his back and the boat moved back to its parallel place. Lance climbed with one hand, the other wrapped around the pale wrists dangling in front of him. It was an awkward climb, and slow. His right arm wailed in distress and pain as he neared the top. Lance had no trouble believing the rope had left a permeant trench on his palm. The man on his back added to his predicament. He was light, but after the climb, not so light anymore. And adding to the battle fatigue, Lance was tired and drained. He was contemplating dropping him into the ocean and be done with it when Pidge’s short arm slid over the railing.

 

“Take my hand if you don’t want to fall.“

 

Lance's immediate reaction was cooing. Pidge does care for him. She scowled darkly, already withdrawing her arm when Lance lunged for it and held tight. She grunted and pulled. With her help, it was marginally easier to climb over the railing with the extra weight on him. He settled the guy down on the wood floo. If it weren’t for the sporadic rise and fall of his chest, Lance would have thought the guy was a corpse, given how deadly pale he was. Pidge took the guy’s wrist and started doing diagnosis.

 

“Slow pulse. No apparent broken bones. No outer wounds.”

 

She pried open an eye. Lance was struck. It was purple. Not the normal purple but a sparkling one. Like when he raised a piece of small amethyst to the sun, all different color from a seemingly boring purple. Lance had never heard of purple eyes but he sure as hell didn’t know everything. This might just be some sort of special birth defect for all he knew. Pidge moved a finger slowly across his vision. The eyes hardly moved. She let the eyelid fall back. “I can’t tell what’s wrong with him from first glance. I need to move him back to the med quarters.” With that she wound her arms underneath the bony man and stood up in one single fluid movement.

 

“Treat yourself first!” Before she disappeared from the doorway, Lance called out, suddenly remembering they had just come back from a battle. His friends were his priority, the passenger could take second seat for all he cared.

 

“Yeah yeah, I heard you.” And with that, she disappeared, braid flashing gold.

 

They all were safe, no one was injured too badly. Lance finally allowed all the tension to seep out of him with an exhale. He leaned his head against the railing, legs spread eagle across the dirty deck. Obstructing the road, as Hunk liked to say, but Hunk wasn't walking across the deck now. Already he could feel his neck locked at a painful perpendicular angle. He would regret this once he worked up the energy to get up. The arm he rested on his stomach jerked slightly; the other one lay dead by his side. He tried to move it. Neither didn't so much as twitch. Lance heaved a defeated sigh. It wasn't like he expected anything less. The rune had drained his arm of all the energy.

 

A loud click drew his attention back to Hunk, who had already finished suspending the little boat to the side of the ship and was making his way towards Lance's sprawled form.

 

"Your arm is dead again?" Hunk dropped down, poking his right arm.

 

Lance squiggled a bit to the left. His whole body followed. The arm stayed exactly where it was.

 

Hunk hummed noncommittally.

 

"It'll be fine." Lance shrugged, reaching his left arm over to pull the right one closer to him. Some of the feelings already coming back. "Did you find anything good?"

 

"Got us a map with the wind movement."

 

"Nice!"

 

"And," Hunk reached into the bag still slunk over his shoulder. His whole arm disappeared inside it as he rummaged around for whatever he was looking for. "This." He proudly pulled out a roll of something. Something brown and looked like tree bark.

 

"What's that?"

 

"Cinnamon." Hunk pressed the thing to Lance's nose. The pungent smell reached deep into his brain and made his eyes water.

 

Lance sneezed loudly.

 

"Don't we have enough cinnamon already?" They had space in the pantry, of course they did. "You literally have, what, two vases full of the powder."

 

"Nah, this is not for cooking. It's for magic."

 

At the mention of magic, Lance perked up. If he had cat ears, they would probably be flicking forward. Hunk and Pidge came up with some of the most brilliant ideas when it came to magic. The portable rune symbols on paper thingy? That was all Pidge. Lance just gave her the basic understanding to work with.

 

“Oh?”

 

Hunk properly sat down, feet folded neatly underneath him and Lance knew, whatever idea Hunk had, it was going to be amazing.

 

“Your mom said that all magic comes at a cost right?” At Lance’s nod, he continued. “Whenever you draw a sigil, a part of your energy is drained. But that’s for you elves.”

 

“And I’m proud of my looks.” Lance flicked his hair haughtily. Hunk’s warm smile was the reward enough.

 

“Pidge and I? We’re human. I can’t even tell where my magic is. For you it’s like tapping into a lake of water-“

 

“Just a puddle at the moment but go on.”

 

“-well Pidge and I can’t do that. So we need an alternative to use magic. She came up with the paper idea. But what if instead of ink, we use crushed cinnamon mixed with ink to draw?” Hunk ended his explanation, snapping off a bit of cinnamon bark and crushed it in his palm.

 

Lance’s thought back to all the theories his Mom had brilliantly embarked on him. “Magic is in the very thing you breathe.” Mom had sung, combing his hair back. “flowers, trees and clouds, magic keeps the world going round. Don’t let them swallow you, or darkness will be your friend.” Lance hadn’t understood at first. He merely thought darkness as the night. If he used magic without restraint, night would come and devour all things. A bit older and he understood.

 

Darkness meant death.

 

If he overused magic, his lifeforce would eat at him until he was nothing but a husk with no soul.

 

_“All things have life force”, Mom had recited a poem. “Table, rock and hawk.”_

 

If he understood correctly, so did paper, cinnamon powder, and wood.

 

“Worth a shot. You’re ready to try.” Lance pushed himself to a proper sit, wincing as his neck protested vehemently.

 

“Maybe later.” Hunk hid a yawn behind the pile of cinnamon bark. “I need sleep.” He pushed himself to his feet, his knees making cheery popping noises and Lance had an irrational craving for crunchy candy. “You coming?”

 

“I’ll sleep up here.” Lance shook his head. He extended his left arm for Hunk to pull him up to his feet. Hunk complied without a fuss. Immediately a bout of vertigo hit him. Hunk, bless him, threw an arm over him to steady him.

 

“Please tell me you’re not going to climb all the way to the crow’s nest in this state?”

 

“Nothing lost, nothing gained, buddy.” Lance smacked his back cheerfully. And if his walk to the main mast was a bit drunken and askew, Hunk didn’t voice his objection again and left Lance to his own devices.

 

Lance was a third of the way to the top when the door snapped shut with a click as Hunk finally retreated below deck for a much deserved break. Lance resumed his slow, inefficient one hand climb. He could feel his right arm now, all pins and needles, but he had yet been able to move it. He prayed to the Lakes that he would be able to at least control it when it was time to go down. He would hate to make a jump from that high up.

 

The cave’s mouth faced eastward, providing him with a direct view to the rising sun. Sunrise at sea was so much different from sunrise on land. It was a refreshing new view that he could never get used to. At sea, he could see the beginning, from a peak to the full circle of the sun. Mountains obstructed his view.

 

The sun was almost fully up when he finally settled down in a comfortable position. The rays that managed to get past the outcropping, rocky surface of the cave warmed his left cheek. A circle of yellow, light, warmth, and energy. The same circle Mom and Dad were watching. Lance’s heart dropped for a moment. He had left them a letter. A letter. Not even a proper goodbye. Just words, arranged in a correct order to be, meaningful. All the explanation and his reasons for leaving. They had lost Allura, and now he chose to go too. But he promised, in the letter and to the sun, that he would come back, and he would come back with Allura. They wouldn’t allow him to go if he so much as let them see his face. Lance also promised to keep Dad’s ship safe for him. And that was what he intended to do. Distant clamoring and commotion pulled him back to the now. The townspeople had gotten up and discovered his gift. That brought a satisfied smirk to his face. He wouldn’t allow the revolution to go down in drains, he would keep on doing it in Allura’s stead. The fingers on his right arm curled into a loose fist. About time it moved. Lance opened them, slowly, and curled them back again. Open and close. Close and open. A simple exercise he devised to let feelings flow back into his arm when he had employed his fire rune earlier.

 

A yawn involuntarily escaped him. Lance contemplated climbing down and crashing on the comfort of his bed but his right arm was still too slow to react. The command from his brain traveled to the hand took as long as a mackerel post. He might have nodded off before he reached the deck and fell to his death.

 

So Lance closed his eyes, let the whooshing wind, warming rays and crashing waves lull him into a light slumber.

 

* * *

 

Lance had no idea how long he was asleep for but when he woke up, the sun was shining directly into his eyeballs, which was impossible since he had the sails open on crow’s nest specifically to keep the sun off his face.

 

“Pidge!” He growled, pressing the heels of both hands onto his eyes. It hurt goddamnit!

 

“Well look who decide to rise and shine.” Pidge’s dry tone reached him from the right, where the ropes holding the sails open were located and Lance only had a second to panic when she untied the knot. The sun hit him in the face at full force.

 

Lance dove for the floor and frantically shielded his face, screaming profanity and wailing all the way.

 

“Oh, stop being a baby.”

 

“You have absolutely no right to say that! You’re the-gah!” Pidge’s booted foot set down on top of his back and pressed him down.

 

“Finish that sentence and I’ll show you who’s the real baby of the Castle.” She hissed, pressing down harder until Lance’s stomach was flat on the warming wood. Lance would love to believe she was joking, but it was Pidge. He didn’t take his chances with Pidge. She was scary.

 

“I concede, I concede!” Lance gave in without much fuss. He could pick his battles, thank you very much. “Ow ow, please let me up please, your boot is making holes on my favorite jac— ouch! I mean I love your boots, they are beautiful lovely things and they are the kindest souls to ever exist in this world.”

 

Thankfully, Pidge removed her boot right after with a snort, little blades stuck to it flashing white in the sunlight. Heck, she most definitely tore several holes in his jacket. Lance spared the blasted boot a disgruntled glare before gingerly sitting up. His fingers went to touch the back of his shirt. Sure enough there were multiple holes there, the largest one he could poke his fingers through and touch the rough fabric of the shirt underneath. If looks could kill, Pidge would been dead five times over and have had all her hair burnt off. As the world liked to throw him into the impossible, Pidge was immune to his glare. She shoved a hand into the pocket of her baggy, soot-strewn pants, the same one she had worn earlier to the battle, and leant against the low boarding of the crow’s nest, her other hand came up to shield her eyes from the harsh glare of the sun. In the orange light, her brown hair turned a fiery brown, loose strands swaying to the sea breeze. Light glinted off the glasses she strung over the neck of the shirt.

 

“Go to bed Lance, I’ll keep guard.” She said, without looking at him.

 

“Who said I was keeping guard?” The words were out of his mouth before he had the chance to think twice about it. He wasn’t keeping guard, not really. He merely wanted to watch the sunrise.

 

“Sure you aren’t.” Pidge scoffed, sparing him a glance from the corner of her eyes. Her brown eyes gained a reddish hint to them.

 

Lance studied her. She seemed calmer, well she was calm. No traces of the earlier panic anywhere on her posture. Lance wasn’t certain about leaving her alone, but she insisted. And he knew her well enough to note a polite request for him to sod off from her rather than simple advice.

 

“If you’re sure.” Lance held out his right hand, painstakingly, for her to pull him up.

 

Pidge glanced at it and turned back looking at the sun. Lance kept his shaking arm still, his smile stretched out even further. He was wearing her down. He just knew it! Moving water carved stones and all those proverbs Allura liked to quote.

 

And finally! Finally, Pidge sighed, and turned around to fully face him. Her hand slapped into his with enough force to send bolts of pain straight into his bones. Unlike Hunk, who could pull Lance to a stand by just standing there and raising his arm high above his head, Pidge walked backwards and leaned half her body over the flimsy wood when there was no space left for another step. Even that wasn’t enough to pull his lanky frame off the ground. Lance let her struggle for a few more seconds, grateful to the world for his height and took pity on her. He braced a hand on the railing and stood up all on his own. The sudden loss of resistance took her by surprise. Pidge let out a cute little squirrel-like squeak as the momentum lifted her feet off the ground. Before she could tumble to her death — Matt would smile and beat him to death with his shoes if he let her — Lance pulled on their still joined hands and placed his other hand, palm wide opened in the air. Her face slammed into it with satisfying smack. Lance smirked. If Pidge thought she could get away with ignoring him, boy was she in for some fun.

 

“Well that was refreshing but my bed is calling for me so see you later little carrier pidgeon,” he said, ready to pull his hand away from her face before she could try anything funny, her hands had reached out and latched onto his limb with surprising strength, nails digging into his skin until it hurt. Then she proceeded to lick. L-I-C-K. Lick his palm.

 

Lance jerked back, shrieking so shrill that birds were shaken out of their morning slumber and left their nest in a fluttering swarm above his hand. Thankfully, Pidge only licked once before letting go, wiping her tongue on her sleeve with a disgusted look. Lance snagged the loose end of her sash and wiped his hand quickly before proceeding to smear it one more time on the wood.

 

“Bleh!” Pidge spat. “That was disgusting. Taste like hand.”

 

“What do you expect!” Lance shrieked back, wiping his hand on the floor with more force than probably healthy for his skin. “Oh lord this is so traumatizing I can cry.”

 

“What about me! I can never get the taste of your sweat, soot and stupidity off my tongue!”

 

“You did that to yourself!”

 

“You smacked me in the face!”

 

“That is very correct! I call truce.”

 

“Agreed! Truce!”

 

They didn’t shake hands or write a contract or anything. Pidge only took a step back, Lance took a step onto the ladder and kept climbing down until he reached the last step. As he trudged to the door that led to the cabins below, Lance could swear up and down until the day he died that he heard a faint “Rest well” floating down from the crow’s nest.

 

* * *

 

Lance managed to get all the sleep he lacked and needed in the span of half a day. He went to bed with the sun painstakingly making its way above the horizon, he woke up to the sun sighing happily as it settled back down for the day. The boat hadn’t moved from her anchored point near the mouth of the cave. When he came up to the deck, Hunk and Pidge had covered every available space with papers, books, cinnamon bark, dark pots of ink and were now having their heads together gazing down at a notebook. Lance’s runes notebook to be exact.

 

“So all animal runes are out?” Pidge said, pointing to a page in the notebook.

 

“Pretty much. Although---” Hunk trailed off and flipped several pages in one quick move, less gently than he normally handled Lance's note. "--Plant runes work just fine. See here? The edges haven't yellowed yet."

 

Lance tiptoed around the mess, even went as far as removing his boots. Viper knew Pidge would kill him for real if he left boot prints on her papers. He knocked his head against theirs. Pidge raised an arm to push his head to rest solely on the side of Hunk's head, who absently reached his right arm over his head to pat Lance on the head. Lance smiled widely, following his friends' gaze downward. A mushroom rune was sketched neatly in cinnamon powder infused ink, judging by the brown specks lining each strokes. The page it was written on had already shown sign of time, edges crumbling in pieces of yellow, brown dots appearing even as he was staring.

 

"How is this 'the edges haven't yellowed yet?' " Lance echoed Hunk's statement, disbelief coloring his tone. Hunk clearly hadn’t gone blind yet— Had he?

 

"Yellowed much." Hunk amended, touching a yellow part of the paper. It crumbled beneath his fingers, fine flakes of dirty yellow fluttering in the wind before dripping down to rest in the pot of ink.

 

Lance had not so much experience and knowledge with paper runes so he just silently watched as the paper consumed by time, yellowing, breaking off, turning into dust that went back to the world and be a part of life. Pidge noted down something in her handbook while Hunk just silently stared, deep in thought. Lance raised his head. The sun was already on its way back to the horizon, slanting strawberry red streams of fine light dying their sails in a delicious pink.

 

Time to go.

 

Lance heaved himself up to stand, dusting off non-existent dust from his knees. He fixed his hat, tightening the strap to keep it from getting blown away and tipping it lower onto his face. Sunlight would be in his direct line of sight when he got the ship out from the alcove and into the endless spread of ocean.

 

Hunk immediately stood up with him and ran off, surely in search for a bucket, leaving a trail of yellow shirt in his wake. Pidge, however just glanced up at him with disdain in her eyes. Lance sent back an apologetic half smile.

 

“I’ll get the anchor up,” she said, and without hearing his response, walked off in faux-nonchalance, hands shoved deep in her pants’ pockets.

 

Lance gazed at her small lithe figure and wondered, not for the last time, if it was a good idea letting her tag along.

 

* * *

The wood sang to him when he smoothed his fingers over them, bringing a smile to his face. He loved Castle, everything was magically tailored to his measurement. The handle wasn’t just stiff wood, it was an extension of himself, a third arm, another knife. A weapon he would use to bring Allura back home.

 

Pidge waved at him, signaling that she had removed the anchor. Lance gave a nod she could not see and turned the wheel. The Castle groaned stridently, working out its crinks and locks on its joint after almost a day sitting still and idle.

 

Waves parted. Wind whistled. Sails unfurled.

 

A smile split his face in two.

 

The thrill of danger, the staccato of the heart in his chest, the call of an adventure coursed through his blood.  

 

His heart thrummed louder, harder as the Castle slowly but surely glided its way out of the cave and into the unknown sea beyond.

 

* * *

 

The map made absolutely no sense to him. Well it did if he needed to know which island was which but it gave absolutely no clue as to where he was. Lance grabbed a pencil, circling haphazardly around Vixa, an island a finger length to the north east of his home island and the one they had just liberated from Galra. East wind hailed around the air in this section of the sky. The emerald compass Pidge lent him sat on one side of the map, a paper stopper. If he assumed correctly, they would come into view of Lahala in a day, which gave them four more days until they could reach Main Land and start searching for Allura.

 

Satisfied with his planning, Lance rolled up the map, pocketed the compass to return to Pidge later and made way for his quarters below deck. Castle smoothly glided on even without him at the helm.

 

Wood creaked ominously under the steel soles of his boots, echoing to and fro from the wooden ceiling, wall and door. Lance's room was towards the tail end of the ship, a small quaint quarter, no bigger than that of Hunk and Pidge’s. The biggest room, the one where the captain was supposed to sleep as per norm with sailors were being used by Pidge as her quarters and connecting infirmary. Saving people was more important than having him comfortable.

 

Lance came into his room. Sunlight streamed through the window, staining the dark frugal furniture in a deep wine. The blanket was thrown haphazardly, half on the bed, half pooling at the floor. He steeped further into his room and closed the door behind him. Clothes strewn across the floor, along with trinkets from Varadero and the beach of the islands they had made a stop at. Lance padded down his jacket, in the search for something he had found at Vixa's rocky coastline. Inner pockets, upper inner pocket, outside pocket, chest pocket. Lance carefully pulled out a small shell as wide as two thumbs and as long as his hand with spikes pointing outward like a porcupine. Hunk and Pidge were verbally against him taking trinkets. Bad luck and misfortune they claimed. Lance had internally snorted. They were at sea, a danger zone, a sacred being, they wore a bloody burning hat the moment their boat touched the briny mass of water. The shell, or bone, was cool to the touch, almost as ice the longer his fingers were connected. Another odd thing to add to his hoard of odd things. Lance put the map away --threw it on the table more like— and grabbed Blue on the way out. She preened under his touch, a lilting greeting. Blue was an affectionate weapon, more so than any other he had came by. He was lucky to have her by his side. Blue sang even louder, happier; a chirping noise, a pull at his heart strings. Lance wiped the deep blue opal lining the handle with his sleeve. He could feel Blue physically rubbing her head against his cheeks, a spring breeze.

 

“Oh I love you too, Blue! You’re an amazing girl, lovely.” Lance cooed, holding Blue with both hands in front of his face. The opal sparkled in no apparent order. Lance grinned. How sweet. Blue could blush.

 

Someone cleared their throat from behind him. Lance jolted, pulling the flap of his coat to cover Blue up, and turned around to see Pidge leaning a tad too heavily against the wall, dark bags under her eyes. Heat rushed up to his ears.

 

“P-Pidge! What are you doing here?”

 

Pidge yawned widely, unimpressed. “Keep an eye on the patient for me for a while. I need food." Then she stumbled away.

 

Lance blinked after her. She must be dead on her feet because the sass didn’t come as he expected.

 

"Sure thing." He mumbled to himself, sheathing Blue and made his way to the infirmary quarters.  


End file.
